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This is a reply to # 2,126,877Cholesterol could easily be described as the smoking gun of the last two decades.
It"s been responsible for demonizing entire categories of foods (like eggs and saturated fats) and blamed for just about every case of heart disease in the last 20 years.
Yet when I first opened my medical practice in the mid 80s, cholesterol, and the fear that yours was too high was rarely talked about.
Somewhere along the way however, cholesterol became a household word -- something that you must keep as low as possible, or suffer the consequences.
You are probably aware that there are many myths that portray fat and cholesterol as one of the worst foods you can consume. Please understand that these myths are actually harming your health.
Not only is cholesterol most likely not going to destroy your health (as you have been led to believe), but it is also not the cause of heart disease.
And for those of you taking cholesterol-lowering drugs, the information that follows could not have been given to you fast enough. But before I delve into this life-changing information, let"s get some basics down first.
What is Cholesterol, and Why Do You Need It?
That"s right, you do need cholesterol.
This soft, waxy substance is found not only in your bloodstream, but also in every cell in your body, where it helps to produce cell membranes, hormones, vitamin D and bile acids that help you to digest fat. Cholesterol also helps in the formation of your memories and is vital for neurological function.
Your liver makes about 75 percent of your body"s cholesterol,[i] and according to conventional medicine, there are two types:
- High-density lipoprotein, or HDL: This is the "good" cholesterol that helps to keep cholesterol away from your arteries and remove any excess from arterial plaque, which may help to prevent heart disease.
- Low-density lipoprotein, or LDL: This "bad" cholesterol circulates in your blood and, according to conventional thinking, may build up in your arteries, forming plaque that makes your arteries narrow and less flexible (a condition called atherosclerosis). If a clot forms in one of these narrowed arteries leading to your heart or brain, a heart attack or stroke may result.
Also making up your total cholesterol count are:
- Triglycerides: Elevated levels of this dangerous fat have been linked to heart disease and diabetes. Triglyceride levels are known to rise from eating too many grains and sugars, being physically inactive, smoking cigarettes, drinking alcohol excessively and being overweight or obese.
- Lipoprotein (a), or Lp(a): Lp(a) is a substance that is made up of an LDL "bad cholesterol" part plus a protein (apoprotein a). Elevated Lp(a) levels are a very strong risk factor for heart disease. This has been well established, yet very few physicians check for it in their patients.
Understand this:
Your Total Cholesterol Level is NOT a Great Indicator of Your Heart Disease Risk
Health officials in the United States urge everyone over the age of 20 to have their cholesterol tested once every five years. Part of this test is your total cholesterol, or the sum of your blood"s cholesterol content, including HDL, LDLs, and VLDLs..
The American Heart Association recommends that your total cholesterol is less than 200 mg/dL, but what they do not tell you is that total cholesterol level is just about worthless in determining your risk for heart disease, unless it is above 330.
In addition, the AHA updated their guidelines in 2004, lowering the recommended level of LDL cholesterol from 130 to LDL to less than 100, or even less than 70 for patients at very high risk.
In order to achieve these outrageous and dangerously low targets, you typically need to take multiple cholesterol-lowering drugs. So the guidelines instantly increased the market for these dangerous drugs. Now, with testing children"s cholesterol levels, they"re increasing their market even more.
I have seen a number of people with total cholesterol levels over 250 who actually were at low heart disease risk due to their HDL levels. Conversely, I have seen even more who had cholesterol levels under 200 that were at a very high risk of heart disease based on the following additional tests:
- HDL/Cholesterol ratio
- Triglyceride/HDL ratios
HDL percentage is a very potent heart disease risk factor. Just divide your HDL level by your cholesterol. That percentage should ideally be above 24 percent.
You can also do the same thing with your triglycerides and HDL ratio. That percentage should be below 2.
Keep in mind, however, that these are still simply guidelines, and there"s a lot more that goes into your risk of heart disease than any one of these numbers. In fact, it was only after word got out that total cholesterol is a poor predictor of heart disease that HDL and LDL cholesterol were brought into the picture.
They give you a closer idea of what"s going on, but they still do not show you everything.
Cholesterol is Neither "Good" Nor "Bad"
Now that we"ve defined good and bad cholesterol, it has to be said that there is actually only one type of cholesterol. Ron Rosedale, MD, who is widely considered to be one of the leading anti-aging doctor in the United States, does an excellent job of explaining this concept:[ii]
"Notice please that LDL and HDL are lipoproteins -- fats combined with proteins. There is only one cholesterol. There is no such thing as "good" or "bad" cholesterol.
Cholesterol is just cholesterol.
It combines with other fats and proteins to be carried through the bloodstream, since fat and our watery blood do not mix very well.
Fatty substances therefore must be shuttled to and from our tissues and cells using proteins. LDL and HDL are forms of proteins and are far from being just cholesterol.
In fact we now know there are many types of these fat and protein particles. LDL particles come in many sizes and large LDL particles are not a problem. Only the so-called small dense LDL particles can potentially be a problem, because they can squeeze through the lining of the arteries and if they oxidize, otherwise known as turning rancid, they can cause damage and inflammation.
Thus, you might say that there is "good LDL" and "bad LDL."
Also, some HDL particles are better than others. Knowing just your total cholesterol tells you very little. Even knowing your LDL and HDL levels will not tell you very much."
Cholesterol is Your Friend, Not Your Enemy
Before we continue, I really would like you to get your mind around this concept.
In the United States, the idea that cholesterol is evil is very much engrained in most people"s minds. But this is a very harmful myth that needs to be put to rest right now.
"First and foremost," Dr. Rosedale points out, "cholesterol is a vital component of every cell membrane on Earth. In other words, there is no life on Earth that can live without cholesterol.
That will automatically tell you that, in and of itself, it cannot be evil. In fact, it is one of our best friends.
We would not be here without it. No wonder lowering cholesterol too much increases one"s risk of dying. Cholesterol is also a precursor to all of the steroid hormones. You cannot make estrogen, testosterone, cortisone, and a host of other vital hormones without cholesterol."
Vitamin D and Your Cholesterol
You probably are aware of the incredible influence of vitamin D on your health. If you aren"t, or need a refresher, you can visit my vitamin D page.
What most people do not realize is that the best way to obtain your vitamin D is from safe exposure to sun on your skin. The UVB rays in sunlight interact with the cholesterol on your skin and convert it to vitamin D.
Bottom line?
If your cholesterol level is too low you will not be able to use the sun to generate sufficient levels of vitamin D.
Additionally, it provides some intuitive feedback that if cholesterol were so dangerous, why would your body use it as precursor for vitamin D and virtually all of the steroid hormones in your body?
Other "evidence" that cholesterol is good for you?
Consider the role of "good" HDL cholesterol. Essentially, HDL takes cholesterol from your body"s tissues and arteries, and brings it back to your liver, where most of your cholesterol is produced. If the purpose of this was to eliminate cholesterol from your body, it would make sense that the cholesterol would be shuttled back to your kidneys or intestines so your body could remove it.
Instead, it goes back to your liver. Why?
Because your liver is going to reuse it.
"It is taking it back to your liver so that your liver can recycle it; put it back into other particles to be taken to tissues and cells that need it," Dr. Rosedale explains. "Your body is trying to make and conserve the cholesterol for the precise reason that it is so important, indeed vital, for health."
Cholesterol and Inflammation – What"s the Connection?
Inflammation has become a bit of a buzzword in the medical field because it has been linked to so many different diseases. And one of those diseases is heart disease … the same heart disease that cholesterol is often blamed for.
What am I getting at?
Well, first consider the role of inflammation in your body. In many respects, it"s a good thing as it"s your body"s natural response to invaders it perceives as threats. If you get a cut for instance, the process of inflammation is what allows you to heal.
Specifically during inflammation:
- Your blood vessels constrict to keep you from bleeding to death
- Your blood becomes thicker so it can clot
- Your immune system sends cells and chemicals to fight viruses, bacteria and other "bad guys" that could infect the area
- Cells multiply to repair the damage
Ultimately, the cut is healed and a protective scar may form over the area.
If your arteries are damaged, a very similar process occurs inside of your body, except that a "scar" in your artery is known as plaque.
This plaque, along with the thickening of your blood and constricting of your blood vessels that normally occur during the inflammatory process, can indeed increase your risk of high blood pressure and heart attacks.
Notice that cholesterol has yet to even enter the picture.
Cholesterol comes in because, in order to replace your damaged cells, it is necessary.
Remember that no cell can form without it.
So if you have damaged cells that need to be replaced, your liver will be notified to make more cholesterol and release it into your bloodstream. This is a deliberate process that takes place in order for your body to produce new, healthy cells.
It"s also possible, and quite common, for damage to occur in your body on a regular basis. In this case, you will be in a dangerous state of chronic inflammation.
The test usually used to determine if you have chronic inflammation is a C-reactive protein (CRP) blood test. CRP level is used as a marker of inflammation in your arteries.
Generally speaking:
- A CRP level under 1 milligrams per liter of blood means you have a low risk for cardiovascular disease
- 1 to 3 milligrams means your risk is intermediate
- More than 3 milligrams is high risk
Even conventional medicine is warming up to the idea that chronic inflammation can trigger heart attacks. But they stop short of seeing the big picture.
In the eyes of conventional medicine, when they see increased cholesterol circulating in your bloodstream, they conclude that it -- not the underlying damage to your arteries -- is the cause of heart attacks.
Which brings me to my next point.
The Insanity of Lowering Cholesterol
Sally Fallon, the president of the Weston A. Price Foundation, and Mary Enig, Ph.D, an expert in lipid biochemistry, have gone so far as to call high cholesterol "an invented disease, a "problem" that emerged when health professionals learned how to measure cholesterol levels in the blood."[iii]
And this explanation is spot on.
If you have increased levels of cholesterol, it is at least in part because of increased inflammation in your body. The cholesterol is there to do a job: help your body to heal and repair.
Conventional medicine misses the boat entirely when they dangerously recommend that lowering cholesterol with drugs is the way to reduce your risk of heart attacks, because what is actually needed is to address whatever is causing your body damage -- and leading to increased inflammation and then increased cholesterol.
As Dr. Rosedale so rightly points out:2
"If excessive damage is occurring such that it is necessary to distribute extra cholesterol through the bloodstream, it would not seem very wise to merely lower the cholesterol and forget about why it is there in the first place.
It would seem much smarter to reduce the extra need for the cholesterol -- the excessive damage that is occurring, the reason for the chronic inflammation."
I"ll discuss how to do this later in the report, but first let"s take a look at the dangers of low cholesterol -- and how it came to be that cholesterol levels needed to be so low in the first place.
If Your Cholesterol is Too Low …
All kinds of nasty things can happen to your body. Remember, every single one of your cells needs cholesterol to thrive -- including those in your brain. Perhaps this is why low cholesterol wreaks havoc on your psyche.
One large study conducted by Dutch researchers found that men with chronically low cholesterol levels showed a consistently higher risk of having depressive symptoms.[iv]
This may be because cholesterol affects the metabolism of serotonin, a substance involved in the regulation of your mood. On a similar note, Canadian researchers found that those in the lowest quarter of total cholesterol concentration had more than six times the risk of committing suicide as did those in the highest quarter.[v]
Dozens of studies also support a connection between low or lowered cholesterol levels and violent behavior, through this same pathway: lowered cholesterol levels may lead to lowered brain serotonin activity, which may, in turn, lead to increased violence and aggression.[vi]
And one meta-analysis of over 41,000 patient records found that people who take statin drugs to lower their cholesterol as much as possible may have a higher risk of cancer,[vii] while other studies have linked low cholesterol to Parkinson"s disease.
What cholesterol level is too low? Brace yourself.
Probably any level much under 150 -- an optimum would be more like 200.
Now I know what you are thinking: "But my doctor tells me my cholesterol needs to be under 200 to be healthy." Well let me enlighten you about how these cholesterol recommendations came to be. And I warn you, it is not a pretty story.
This is a significant issue. I have seen large numbers of people who have their cholesterol lowered below 150, and there is little question in my mind that it is causing far more harm than any benefit they are receiving by lowering their cholesterol this low.
Who Decided What Cholesterol Levels are Healthy or Harmful?
In 2004, the U.S. government"s National Cholesterol Education Program panel advised those at risk for heart disease to attempt to reduce their LDL cholesterol to specific, very low, levels.
Before 2004, a 130-milligram LDL cholesterol level was considered healthy. The updated guidelines, however, recommended levels of less than 100, or even less than 70 for patients at very high risk.
Keep in mind that these extremely low targets often require multiple cholesterol-lowering drugs to achieve.
Fortunately, in 2006 a review in the Annals of Internal Medicine[viii] found that there is insufficient evidence to support the target numbers outlined by the panel. The authors of the review were unable to find research providing evidence that achieving a specific LDL target level was important in and of itself, and found that the studies attempting to do so suffered from major flaws.
Several of the scientists who helped develop the guidelines even admitted that the scientific evidence supporting the less-than-70 recommendation was not very strong.
So how did these excessively low cholesterol guidelines come about?
Eight of the nine doctors on the panel that developed the new cholesterol guidelines had been making money from the drug companies that manufacture statin cholesterol-lowering drugs.[ix]
The same drugs that the new guidelines suddenly created a huge new market for in the United States.
Coincidence? I think not.
Now, despite the finding that there is absolutely NO evidence to show that lowering your LDL cholesterol to 100 or below is good for you, what do you think the American Heart Association STILL recommends?
Lowering your LDL cholesterol levels to less than 100.[x]
And to make matters worse, the standard recommendation to get to that level almost always includes one or more cholesterol-lowering drugs.
The Dangers of Cholesterol-Lowering Medications
If you are concerned about your cholesterol levels, taking a drug should be your absolute last resort. And when I say last resort, I"m saying the odds are very high, greater than 100 to 1, that you don"t need drugs to lower your cholesterol.
To put it another way, among the more than 20,000 patients who have come to my clinic, only four or five of them truly needed these drugs, as they had genetic challenges of familial hypercholesterolemia that required it..
Contrast this to what is going on in the general population. According to data from Medco Health Solutions Inc., more than half of insured Americans are taking drugs for chronic health conditions. And cholesterol-lowering medications are the second most common variety among this group, with nearly 15 percent of chronic medication users taking them (high blood pressure medications -- another vastly over-prescribed category -- were first).[xi]
Disturbingly, as written in BusinessWeek early in 2008, "Some researchers have even suggested -- half-jokingly -- that the medications should be put in the water supply."[xii]
Count yourself lucky that you probably do NOT need to take cholesterol-lowering medications, because these are some nasty little pills.
Statin drugs work by inhibiting an enzyme in your liver that"s needed to manufacture cholesterol. What is so concerning about this is that when you go tinkering around with the delicate workings of the human body, you risk throwing everything off kilter.
Case in point, "statin drugs inhibit not just the production of cholesterol, but a whole family of intermediary substances, many if not all of which have important biochemical functions in their own right," say Enig and Fallon.3
For starters, statin drugs deplete your body of Coenzyme Q10 (CoQ10), which is beneficial to heart health and muscle function. Because doctors rarely inform people of this risk and advise them to take a CoQ10 supplement, this depletion leads to fatigue, muscle weakness, soreness, and eventually heart failure.
Muscle pain and weakness, a condition called rhabdomyolysis, is actually the most common side effect of statin drugs, which is thought to occur because statins activate the atrogin-1 gene, which plays a key role in muscle atrophy.[xiii]
By the way, muscle pain and weakness may be an indication that your body tissues are actually breaking down -- a condition that can cause kidney damage.
Statin drugs have also been linked to:
- An increased risk of polyneuropathy (nerve damage that causes pain in the hands and feet and trouble walking)
- Dizziness
- Cognitive impairment, including memory loss[xiv]
- A potential increased risk of cancer[xv]
- Decreased function of the immune system[xvi]
- Depression
- Liver problems, including a potential increase in liver enzymes (so people taking statins must be regularly monitored for normal liver function)
And recently a possible association was found between statins and an increased risk of Lou Gehrig"s disease.[xvii]
Other cholesterol-lowering drugs besides statins also have side effects, most notably muscle pain and weakness.
IMPORTANT NOTE
If, for whatever reason, you or someone you know or love does not believe the information in this report and chooses to stay on statin drugs, then please make sure they at least take one to two Ubiquinols per day.
This will help prevent all the side effects mentioned above.
Ubiquinol is the reduced version of Coenzyme Q-10 and is far more effective if you are over 35-40 years old. It is the form of the supplement that actually works, and if you take CoQ-10 and your body can"t reduce it to uniquinol you are just fooling yourself and wasting your money.
You can visit our ubiquinol information page for more details.
Are Cholesterol Drugs Even Effective?
With all of these risks, the drugs had better be effective, right? Well, even this is questionable. At least, it depends on how you look at it.
Most cholesterol lowering drugs can effectively lower your cholesterol numbers, but are they actually making you any healthier, and do they help prevent heart disease?
Have you ever heard of the statistic known as NNT, or number needed to treat?
I didn"t think so. In fact, most doctors haven"t either. And herein lies the problem.
NNT answers the question: How many people have to take a particular drug to avoid one incidence of a medical issue (such as a heart attack)?
For example, if a drug had an NNT of 50 for heart attacks, then 50 people have to take the drug in order to prevent one heart attack.
Easy enough, right?
Well, drug companies would rather that you not focus on NNT, because when you do, you get an entirely different picture of their "miracle" drugs. Take, for instance, Pfizer"s Lipitor, which is the most prescribed cholesterol medication in the world and has been prescribed to more than 26 million Americans.[xviii]
According to Lipitor"s own Web site, Lipitor is clinically proven to lower bad cholesterol 39-60 percent, depending on the dose. Sounds fairly effective, right?
Well, BusinessWeek actually did an excellent story on this very topic earlier this year,[xix] and they found the REAL numbers right on Pfizer"s own newspaper ad for Lipitor.
Upon first glance, the ad boasts that Lipitor reduces heart attacks by 36 percent. But there is an asterisk. And when you follow the asterisk, you find the following in much smaller type:
"That means in a large clinical study, 3% of patients taking a Sugar pill or placebo had a heart attack compared to 2% of patients taking Lipitor."
What this means is that for every 100 people who took the drug over 3.3 years, three people on placebos, and two people on Lipitor, had heart attacks. That means that taking Lipitor resulted in just one fewer heart attack per 100 people.
The NNT, in this case, is 100. One hundred people have to take Lipitor for more than three years to prevent one heart attack. And the other 99 people, well, they"ve just dished out hundreds of dollars and increased their risk of a multitude of side effects for nothing.
So you can see how the true effectiveness of cholesterol drugs like Lipitor is hidden behind a smokescreen.
Or in some cases, not hidden at all.
Zetia and Vytorin: No Medical Benefits
Early in 2008, it came out that Zetia, which works by inhibiting absorption of cholesterol from your intestines, and Vytorin, which is a combination of Zetia and Zocor (a statin drug), do not work.
This was discovered AFTER the drugs acquired close to 20 percent of the U.S. market for cholesterol-lowering drugs. And also after close to 1 million prescriptions for the drugs were being written each week in the United States, bringing in close to $4 billion in 2007.[xx]
It was only after the results of a trial by the drugs" makers, Merck and Schering-Plough, were released that this was found out. Never mind that the trial was completed in April 2006, and results were not released until January 2008.
And it"s no wonder the drug companies wanted to hide these results.
While Zetia does lower cholesterol by 15 percent to 20 percent, trials did not show that it reduces heart attacks or strokes, or that it reduces plaques in arteries that can lead to heart problems.
The trial by the drugs" makers, which studied whether Zetia could reduce the growth of plaques, found that plaques grew nearly twice as fast in patients taking Zetia along with Zocor (Vytorin) than in those taking Zocor alone.[xxi]
Of course, the answer is not to turn back to typical statin drugs to lower your cholesterol, as many of the so-called experts would have you believe.
You see, statins are thought to have a beneficial effect on inflammation in your body, thereby lowering your risk of heart attack and stroke.
But you can lower inflammation in your body naturally, without risking any of the numerous side effects of statin drugs. This should also explain why my guidelines for lowering cholesterol are identical to those to lower inflammation.
For more in-depth information about cholesterol-lowering drugs, please see my recently updated statin drug index page.
How to Lower Inflammation, and Thereby Your Risk of Heart Disease, Naturally
There is a major misconception that you must avoid foods like eggs and saturated fat to protect your heart. While it"s true that fats from animal sources contain cholesterol, I"ve explained earlier in this article why this should not scare you -- but I"ll explain even further here.
This misguided principle is based on the "lipid hypothesis" -- developed in the 1950s by nutrition pioneer Ancel Keys -- that linked dietary fat to coronary heart disease.
The nutrition community of that time completely accepted the hypothesis, and encouraged the public to cut out butter, red meat, animal fats, eggs, dairy and other "artery clogging" fats from their diets -- a radical change at that time.
What you may not know is that when Keys published his analysis that claimed to prove the link between dietary fats and coronary heart disease, he selectively analyzed information from only six countries to prove his correlation, rather than comparing all the data available at the time -- from 22 countries.
As a result of this "cherry-picked" data, government health organizations began bombarding the public with advice that has contributed to the diabetes and obesity epidemics going on today: eat a low-fat diet.
Not surprisingly, numerous studies have actually shown that Keys" theory was wrong and saturated fats are healthy, including these studies from Fallon and Enig"s classic article The Skinny on Fats:[xxii]
- A survey of South Carolina adults found no correlation of blood cholesterol levels with "bad" dietary habits, such as use of red meat, animal fats, fried foods, butter, eggs, whole milk, bacon, sausage and cheese.[xxiii]
- A Medical Research Council survey showed that men eating butter ran half the risk of developing heart disease as those using margarine.[xxiv]
Of course, as Americans cut out nutritious animal fats from their diets, they were left hungry. So they began eating more processed grains, more vegetable oils, and more high-fructose corn syrup, all of which are nutritional disasters.
It is this latter type of diet that will eventually lead to increased inflammation, and therefore cholesterol, in your body. So don"t let anyone scare you away from saturated fat anymore.
Chronic inflammation is actually caused by a laundry list of items such as:
- Oxidized cholesterol (cholesterol that has gone rancid, such as that from overcooked, scrambled eggs)
- Eating lots of Sugar and grains
- Eating foods cooked at high temperatures
- Eating trans fats
- A sedentary lifestyle
- Smoking
- Emotional stress
So to sum it all up, in order to lower your inflammation and cholesterol levels naturally, you must address the items on this list.
How to Lower Your Cholesterol Naturally …
- Make sure you"re getting plenty of high-quality, animal-based omega3-fats. I prefer those from krill oil. New research suggests that as little as 500 mg may lower your total cholesterol and triglycerides and will likely increase your HDL cholesterol.
- Reduce, with the plan of eliminating, grains and sugars in your daily diet. It is especially important to eliminate dangerous sugars such as fructose. If your HDL/Cholesterol ratio is abnormal and needs to be improved it would also serve you well to virtually eliminate fruits from your diet, as that it also a source of fructose. Once your cholesterol improves you can gradually reintroduce it to levels that don"t raise your cholesterol.
- Eat the right foods for your nutritional type. You can learn your nutritional type by taking our FREE test.
- Eat a good portion of your food raw.
- Eat healthy, preferably raw, fats that correspond to your nutritional type. This includes:
- Olive oil
- Coconut and coconut oil
- Organic raw dairy products (including butter, cream, sour cream, cheese, etc.)
- Avocados
- Raw nuts
- Seeds
- Eggs (lightly cooked with yolks intact or raw)
- Organic, grass-fed meats
- Get the right amount of exercise, especially Peak Fitness type of exercise. When you exercise you increase your circulation and the blood flow throughout your body. The components of your immune system are also better circulated, which means your immune system has a better chance of fighting an illness before it has the opportunity to spread.
- Avoid smoking and drinking excessive amounts of alcohol.
- Address your emotional challenges. I particularly love the Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) for stress management.
So there you have it; the reasons why high cholesterol is a worry that many of you simply do not need to have, along with a simple plan to optimize yours.
If someone you love is currently taking cholesterol-lowering drugs, I urge you to share this information with them as well, and take advantage of the thousands of free pages of information on www.Mercola.com.
For the majority of you reading this right now, there"s no reason to risk your health with cholesterol-lowering drugs. With the plan I"ve just outlined, you"ll achieve the cholesterol levels you were meant to have, along with the very welcome "side effects" of increased energy, mood and mental clarity.
Too good to be true?
Hardly.
For the vast majority of people, making a few lifestyle changes causes healthy cholesterol levels to naturally occur.
As always, your health really is in your hands. Now it"s up to you to take control -- and shape it into something great.
References
[i] American Heart Association January 23, 2008
[ii] Mercola.com, Cholesterol is NOT the Cause of Heart Disease, Ron Rosedale May 28, 2005
[iii] Fallon, S. and Mary Enig. "Dangers of Statin Drugs: What You Haven"t Been Told About Popular Cholesterol-Lowering Medicines," The Weston A. Price Foundation
[iv] Psychosomatic Medicine 2000;62.
[v] Epidemiology 2001 Mar;12:168-72
[vi] Annals of Internal Medicine (1998;128(6):478-487) The Journal of the American Medical Association (1997;278:313-321)
[vii] Journal of the American College of Cardiology July 31, 2007; 50:409-418
[viii] Annals of Internal Medicine October 3, 2006; 145(7): 520-530
[ix] USAToday.com October 16, 2004
[x] American Heart Association, "What Your Cholesterol Level Means," accessed May 22, 2008
[xi] MSNBC.com More than half of Americans on chronic meds May 14, 2008(accessed June 9, 2008)
[xii] BusinessWeek Do Cholesterol Drugs Do Any Good? January 17, 2008 (accessed June 9, 2008)
[xiii] The Journal of Clinical Investigation December 2007; 117(12):3940-51
[xiv] Mercola.com Sudden Memory Loss Linked to Cholesterol Drugs
[xv] Nature Medicine September, 2000;6:965-966, 1004-1010.
[xvi] Nature Medicine, December, 2000; 6: 1311-1312, 1399-1402
[xvii] Edwards, I. Ralph; Star, Kristina; Kiuru, Anne, "Statins, Neuromuscular Degenerative Disease and an Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis-Like Syndrome," Drug Safety, Volume 30, Number 6, 2007 , pp. 515-525(11)
[xviii] IMS Heallth. IMS National Prescription Audit Plus July 2007.
[xix] BusinessWeek.com, "Do Cholesterol Drugs Do Any Good?" January 17, 2008 (accessed June 10, 2008)
[xx] New York Times, "Cardiologists Question Delay of Data on 2 Drugs," November 21, 2007 (accessed June 10, 2008)
[xxi] New York Times, "Drug Has No Benefit in Trial, Makers Say," January 14, 2008 (accessed June 10, 2008)
[xxii] Enig, M and Sally Fallon, "The Skinny on Fats," The Weston A. Price Foundation,
[xxiii] Lackland, D T, et al, J Nutr, Nov 1990, 120:11S:1433-1436
[xxiv] Nutr Week, Mar 22, 1991, 21:12:2-3
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Eight of the nine influential doctors responsible for forming new cholesterol guidelines may be blinded by dollar signs. It seems they have been making money from drug companies by urging patients to take their drugs.
Lunatic Recommendations For Statin Drug Use
"Experts" from the American College of Physicians recommended that most diabetics should be taking cholesterol-lowering medication to reduce their risk of having a heart attack--even if their cholesterol levels fell in the normal range.
Why Low Cholesterol is NOT Good For You
Low Cholesterol Causes Aggressive Behavior
Despite the fact that most people are worried about having cholesterol levels that are too high, yet another study has found that low cholesterol is actually associated with adverse behavioral effects such as aggression and depression.
Low Cholesterol Linked to Depression
Results of a study conducted by Dutch researchers provide additional evidence for a link between low cholesterol levels and an increased risk of Depression in men.
Low Cholesterol Linked to Stroke Risk
If your cholesterol levels are too low, it may increase your risk of stroke.
Low Cholesterol Linked to Violence
Lowering cholesterol could trigger changes in brain chemistry that encourage violent behavior.
Read this article and/or sign up for Dr. Mercola's FREE NewsLetter click here.
© Copyright 2010 Dr. Joseph Mercola. All Rights Reserved.
This content may be copied in full, with copyright, contact, creation and information intact, without specific permission, when used only in a not-for-profit format.
- Cholesterol's Good Side: Cholesterol... plzchuckle
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This is a reply to # 2,126,877(NaturalNews) Cholesterol is labeled as one of the top health villains in society today, but some researchers say it isn't the harmful substance that agencies claim. In fact, there is evidence that points to cholesterol having a positive effect on the body. One benefit that may be related to higher cholesterol is a lower rate of infection.
In 1984 a study was published in the Journal of Holistic Medicine which showed that cholesterol can function as an antioxidant, protecting the body from free radicals and therefore strengthening the immune system. Cholesterol is a precursor to vitamin D, which is a necessary nutrient for immune system function. It is also a precursor to corticosteroids, hormones that protect the body against stress. Stress, as we know, suppresses the immune system.
At the Division of Epidemiology at the University of Minnesota, records of 19 studies were reviewed, examining the causes of death in more than 68,000 cases. The results of these studies showed many patients who died of diseases with infectious origins also had low cholesterol levels.
To determine whether low cholesterol caused infection or if infection caused low cholesterol, Professor David R. Jacobs and Dr. Carlos Iribarren looked at more than 100,000 healthy individuals over a period of 15 years. Those who began the study with low cholesterol levels suffered from more cases of infection than those with higher cholesterol levels.
Of course, like all fats, cholesterol does come in both good forms and bad. Highly processed cholesterol that has been exposed to heat and oxygen can become damaged and oxidized. Similar to refined fats, this type of cholesterol is not healthy for the body.
It seems as if many studies done today to examine the effects of cholesterol in the body are performed with the preconceived idea that cholesterol can only be harmful. We may benefit from further research that truly examines the causes of high cholesterol and the resulting effects.
Conditions that raise cholesterol levels, such as chronic stress and hypothyroidism, may actually be the primary cause behind diseases for which high cholesterol often takes the blame.
It's around every corner, on television commercials, in health magazines and even in bold print on product labels on the grocery shelves: cholesterol gets plenty of media coverage as the bad guy. It's time to take another look at this mislabeled substance and see if cholesterol is, indeed, the cause of serious health problems such as heart disease. The very thing we've been told to avoid like the plague may be a missing element in today's highly processed diet.
Ravnskov, Uffe. The Benefits of High Cholesterol. (2004) Retrieved from http://www.westonaprice.org/modernd...
Fallon, Sally. Nourishing Traditions: The Cookbook that Challenges Politically Correct Nutrition and Diet Dictocrats, Revised Second Edition. (2001)
About the author
Elizabeth Walling is a freelance writer, specializing in articles about health and family nutrition. She is a strong believer in natural living as a way to improve health and prevent common illnesses.
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Cholesterol's Good Side: Cholesterol may Guard Against Infection an... - Dispel the Myths: High Cholesterol i... plzchuckle
11 y
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This is a reply to # 2,126,877
(NaturalNews) Most people react to being told they have high cholesterol in the same way they would if they were told they have cancer. Somehow the idea of having high cholesterol can strike deep fear into the heart of a person. After all, doesn't a high cholesterol reading mean you are a walking heart attack waiting to happen?
That's what we've been told for decades by the media and the medical profession, but more recently evidence is coming to light that says high cholesterol may not be an accurate predictor of heart attack. This may come as a shock to anyone who has followed the idea that lowering your cholesterol will prevent heart disease. In fact, such ideas prevent people from looking at the big picture: there are many risk factors associated with heart disease, and putting all of the blame on cholesterol causes people to ignore other more prevalent factors.
Most people are familiar with the terms "good" cholesterol and "bad" cholesterol. HDL is considered good cholesterol, while LDL is considered bad. High LDL levels may not be as much of a risk factor if HDL levels are also high. In the same way, low HDL levels and moderate LDL may show up as a low cholesterol reading, but it might be a more dangerous arrangement than overall high cholesterol numbers.
In addition, traditional cholesterol readings do not look at the possible variations in LDL cholesterol particles. LDL is considered the "bad" cholesterol, but this is only half true. In simple terms, LDL particles can be either small or large. Large particles seem to do little harm in the body while small LDL particles do more serious damage and may be a more reliable predictor of heart disease.
It's important to keep in mind that one of cholesterol's many duties is to repair lesions in the arteries. So, the reality is that cholesterol in the arteries is a symptom of heart problems more than an actual cause. It does not actually travel to the heart just to stick to the walls of your arteries and give you heart disease. Cholesterol is really in your arteries because of damage that has already been incurred.
If high cholesterol itself was a clear predictor of heart attack, then you must assume that lowing cholesterol levels is an effective way to prevent heart attacks. This is simply not true. Looking at the combined results of more than 40 different trials which looked at whether lowering cholesterol levels reduced the occurrence of heart disease, you might be surprised at the results. Analysis shows there were similar rates of heart attack and overall mortality both in the groups who lowered their cholesterol and in those who did not.
A study done at the University Hospital in Toronto looked at 120 men who had previously had a heart attack. The study showed men with high cholesterol or low cholesterol were equally likely to have a second heart attack. Another Canadian study followed 5,000 men for twelve years and could not find a link between high cholesterol and heart attack.
A study called the Honolulu Heart Program was published in 2001. It looked at more than 8,000 individuals and made this statement: "Long-term persistence of low cholesterol concentration actually increases the risk of death. Thus, the earlier the patients start to have lower cholesterol concentrations, the greater the risk of death."
Of course, cholesterol levels shouldn't be ignored entirely. It's important to have an accurate picture of your overall health, and very high cholesterol may be an indicator of other risk factors. But simply lowering your cholesterol may not prevent the onset of heart disease. By taking some of the heat off cholesterol, people can truly take charge of their health by minimizing other risk factors such as stress, obesity and inactivity.
Sources:
http://thehealthyskeptic.org/choles...
http://trusted.md/blog/vreni_gurd/2...
http://heartscanblog.blogspot.com/2...
http://www.ravnskov.nu/myth5.htm
About the author
Elizabeth Walling is a freelance writer specializing in health and family nutrition. She is a strong believer in natural living as a way to improve health and prevent modern disease. To learn more about getting healthy and fit through a nourishing diet and healthy living, visit Elizabeth's blog: www.livingthenourishedlife.com
Dispel the Myths: High Cholesterol is Not to Blame for Heart Disease
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- Does Cholesterol Matter? Only if You... plzchuckle
11 y
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This is a reply to # 2,126,877
(NaturalNews) The makers of Zetia and Vytorin (which combines Zetia and Zocor) recently announced that their aggressively advertised cholesterol-lowering drugs failed to slow the development of fatty plaque in arteries. In fact, the drugs actually promote the formation of plaque in arteries, which fuels heart disease and increases the risk of a heart attack. The announcement –- in a news release, not a medical journal –- came after long delays in reporting the findings of their study.
Why the delays? Follow the money. Sales of the two drugs added up to $5 billion in revenues in 2007.
The news release was the first of several fascinating and bizarre reports on Zetia and Vytorin. Even though the drugs don’t prevent heart disease, the American Heart Association quickly issued an official news release in defense of the drugs.
If you’re confused by that, just follow the money trail again. According to an article in the New York Times, the American Heart Association gets $2 million a year from Merck/Schering-Plough Pharmaceuticals, the pharmaceutical group that markets Vytorin.
The failure of this and other recent cholesterol-lowering drug trials has renewed a long-simmering debate about the role of cholesterol in heart disease. Cholesterol is a symptom -- get that, a symptom -- not a cause of heart disease, and Vytorin and other drugs merely alter a symptom. In fact, cholesterol has long been known as only a weak indicator of heart disease risk (American Journal of Epidemiology, 1977;105:281-9). Half of the people who have heart attacks have normal cholesterol levels.
What then causes heart disease? The answer is a variety of factors, most of which are no-brainers, such as prediabetes and being overweight, which result from excess intake of refined sugars, processed sugar-like carbohydrates, and trans fats. This dietary pattern elevates blood sugar, insulin –- and, yes, cholesterol, see (www.stopprediabetesnow.com) . Even the oft-recommended high-carb diet for preventing heart disease raises cholesterol and triglyceride levels. That's because, in most people, elevated cholesterol and triglyceride levels reflect Sugar and carb intake, not fats.
If all this isn’t strange enough, consider one more recent report. The average cholesterol level of Americans is now lower than it was back in 1960 because of all the cholesterol-lowering drugs that have been prescribed. At the same time, two-thirds of Americans are now overweight –- the number one risk factor for diabetes and heart disease. In effect, Rome is burning while medicine fiddles with cholesterol.
About the author
Jack Challem, The Nutrition Reporter, is a personal nutrition coach and one of America's most trusted nutrition and health writers. Based in Tucson, Arizona, he is the bestselling author of more than 20 books, including Stop Prediabetes Now, The Food-Mood Solution, Feed Your Genes Right, and The Inflammation Syndrome. Jack is a columnist for Alternative & Complementary Therapies and his scientific articles have also appeared in Free Radical Biology & Medicine, Journal of Orthomolecular Medicine, Medical Hypotheses, and other journals. Free, downloadable excerpts from his books, and sample issues of his print newsletters are available at http://www.nutritionreporter.com.
Does Cholesterol Matter? Only if You're on a Cholesterol-Lowering Drug - Does High Cholesterol REALLY Cause H... plzchuckle
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Dr. Mercola
December 05 2009
An Interview with Uffe Ravnskov, MD, PhD
When did you begin to suspect that the cholesterol theory of atherosclerosis might be wrong? What led you to this conclusion? Before then, had you believed in the cholesterol theory? Was this part of your training?
I have never thought that it was true. I heard about it for the first time in 1962 shortly after getting my MD. My biochemical knowledge was still intact at that time and I knew that cholesterol was one of the most important molecules in your body, indispensable for the building of your cells and for producing stress and sex hormones as well as vitamin D.
The idea that cholesterol in the blood should kill us if its concentration is a little higher than normal, as they wrote in the Framingham paper, seemed to me just as silly as to claim that yellow fingers cause lung cancer.
Would you tell my readers about your training, publications, university appointments, other professional activities?
The first seven years as a doctor I worked in different medical departments in Denmark and Sweden. In 1968 I started my academic career at the Department of Nephrology, University Hospital in Lund, where I got my PhD. After a few years I organized a research team to investigate the association between hydrocarbon exposure and glomerulonephritis
Unfortunately I caught one of my coworkers in producing a fraudulent paper. It was unfortunate, because it is risky to be a whistleblower in the academic world. Instead of excluding the fraudulent researcher it was my research that was questioned. The resistance against my research from my superiors became intolerable, and I therefore decided to go into private practice.
Nevertheless I succeeded in publishing the main part of my research in major medical journals after having left the department. I have summarized my my findings and conclusions on the web as well.
In the late eighties the cholesterol campaign was started in Sweden. I was very surprised because I couldn’t recall anything in the scientific literature in support of it. I started reading it systematically, and I soon realized that I was right.
Since then I have published about eighty papers and letter, and also books, translated into five languages, where I present my arguments and criticism.
How has your work been received by your colleagues; by healthcare professionals and consumers around the world?
In the beginning nobody took notice. To ignore criticism is the most effective way to maintain a false idea. My first book was published in Sweden in 1991 with a Finnish edition shortly afterwards. The Swedish one made no impact whatsoever, and the Finnish one was put on fire in a television show.
Ridicule and slander have been used as well, as a means to muffle me
After I had aired my warnings against statin treatment in Dutch television, for instance, Dutch researchers described me in a following show as a crackpot who had been kicked from the universities of Copenhagen and Lund. The directors of the show offered my critics a possibility to discuss the issue with me on television, but all of them declined. On his blog, Michael Eades has described how one of them later on belittled me in a scientific paper.
But I have also realized that I am not alone.
Seven years ago I started THINCS, The International Network of Cholesterol Skeptics ( http://www.thincs.org ), which by now includes about eighty doctors, professors and other researchers from all over the world, who share my skepticism, and I have received two international awards for my contributions.
Also encouraging is the hundreds of emails that I receive every year from patients, who have regained their health after having stopped their cholesterol-lowering treatment.
Your work seems to validate what many integrative health care professionals have been saying for decades. How does the alternative community respond to you?
There is a much more open attitude from these people.
If the cholesterol hypothesis is an error, does this mean that all of its therapies – low cholesterol diet, cholesterol lowering natural therapies and medications -- are wrong?
Absolutely. This kind of treatment is meaningless, costly, and has transformed millions of healthy people into patients.
Specifically, what are your views on statins?
Their benefit is trivial, and has been seen only in male patients who already have heart disease.
Worse is that their many adverse effects are ignored or cleverly belittled by the trial directors. Independent researchers have found many more and in much higher numbers. If they are true it means that today millions of previously healthy people probably consider their weak and painful muscles, their bad memory, their sexua| failure, and their cancer to be a consequence of increasing age, and so do their doctors.
The risk of cancer is most alarming. Both animal experiments, epidemiological studies and several of the statin trials have shown that low cholesterol predisposes to cancer.
The widespread use of statin treatment probably explains why the decrease of the smoking habit that has been going on in many countries hasn’t been followed by a decrease of cancer mortality. We should have seen a decrease because smoking predispose not only to bronchial cancer, but to all kinds of cancer.
Drug companies market vigorously the highest, strongest doses of statins. Lipitor is pushed at the highest dosage, 80 mg. This dosage is the most powerful for lowering cholesterol and LDL, but it also causes more adverse effects and costs more than lower doses. What are your thoughts about this?
The outcome from these trials is a further demonstration that the small benefit from statin treatment has nothing to do with cholesterol.
For instance, although cholesterol plummeted and remained at about 50 percent below the initial value during the whole SEAS trial, it did not change mortality, but it increased the number of cancer with statistical significance.
Even worse was the result of the ENHANCE trial, where atherosclerosis in patients with familial hypercholesterolemia progressed the most among those whose cholesterol was lowered the most.
If statins can be helpful in reducing the incidence of heart attacks, who should take them?
In my view, nobody.
When I was practicing, I used to describe the benefit in this way: Considering your age and your previous heart attack, your chance to be alive in five years is about 90 percent. You can increase that chance to 92 percent if you take a statin pill every day, but then you may also expose yourself to its many adverse effects.
From the data I have seen, statins have not produced a reduction in overall cardiac deaths. Do you have any idea of why this is?
You are right. Heart mortality in Sweden is going downwards, but the reduction started already in the 1960’s. The cause is most probably that treatment of acute myocardial infarction has improved, because the mortality curve has not changed after the introduction of the statins.
The reason may be that their small benefit is counteracted by an increasing frequency of heart failure.
As you know, the statins block not only the synthesis of cholesterol, but also of other vital molecules, for instance coenzyme Q10, and muscle cells, including those of the heart, can’t function properly without Q10.
Do you think mainstream medicine will ever relinquish its view that elevated cholesterol causes heart disease, and that statins are the magic bullet?
I hope so. The failures of the most recent statin trials have been commented on by several journalists in the major U.S. newspapers. In Sweden a revolution is going on. Here, a general practitioner treated her own obesity successfully by eating a low-carbohydrate diet with a high content of animal fat. When she advised her obese and diabetic patients to do the same, she was reported to the National Board of Health and Welfare for malpractice.
After a two-year-long investigation she was acquitted, as her treatment was considered to be in accord with scientific evidence.
At the same time, the Board dismissed two experts, who had been appointed for updating the dietary recommendations for diabetics, because it came up that they were sponsored by the food industry. Instead the Board has asked independent researchers to review the scientific literature.
The subject has gained general attention due to a number of radio and television shows, where critical experts including myself have discussed the issue with representatives of the official view.
Most important, thousands of patients have experienced themselves that by doing the opposite as recommended by the current guidelines they have regained their health!
The effect has been that the sales of butter, cream, and full-fat milk are increasing in Sweden after many years of decline, and a recent poll showed that a majority of Swedish people today think that the best way of losing weight is by a low-carbohydrate, fat-rich diet.
Further progress was achieved this spring. Several times, colleagues of mine and also I, have asked the Swedish Food Administration for the scientific basis of their warnings against saturated fat. We have been met with the argument that there are thousands of such studies, or by referrals to the WHO guidelines or the Nordic Nutrition Recommendations.
As the main argument in the latter two -- that saturated fat raises cholesterol -- we were not satisfied with their answer, and finally the Food Administration published a list with 72 studies that they claimed were in support of their view on saturated fat, and twelve that were not.
We scrutinized the lists and found that only two of the 72 studies supported their standpoint; eleven studies did not concern saturated fat at all, and the unsupportive list was incomplete, to put it mildly.
We published a short report with our comments to these lists in the Swedish medical journal Dagens Medicin. A response from the Food Administration appeared seven weeks later in which they pointed out that their recommendations were directed to healthy people, not to patients. They maintained that they were based on solid scientific evidence, without mentioning anything about saturated fat, and without answering our critical comments.
But this is not all. Earlier this year Sachdeva et al reported that the mean cholesterol in 137,000 patients with acute myocardial infarction was lower than normal.
As usual, the authors didn’t understand their own findings, but concluded that cholesterol should be lowered even more. A few months later Al-Mallah et al. came up with the same result and conclusion, although they also reported that three years later, mortality was twice as high among those who had been admitted with the lowest cholesterol.
These results created a fierce debate in one of the major Swedish newspapers. It was opened by ninety-one-year old Lars Werkö, the ‘Grand Old Man’ in Swedish medical science, retired professor in internal medicine and former head of The Swedish Council on Technology Assessment in Health Care, together with Tore Scherstén, retired professor in surgery and former secretary of the Swedish Medical Research Council.
“Now it is time to sack the cholesterol hypothesis and to investigate the reason of this scientific breakdown” they wrote.
They also criticized American researchers in AHA and NHLBI and their followers for sloppy and fraudulent science.
They were of course attacked by two professors and representatives of the current view, but none of them came up with any substantial evidence, only with personalities.
Are there other risk factors that should be followed? Such as: C-reactive protein, fibrinogen, homocysteine, lipoprotein A... Any other factors?
Such analyses may be helpful for doctors to put the right diagnosis in patients with a disease of unknown origin.
But to check healthy people’s blood to find deviations from normal is the freeway to unnecessary medication.
Are there other alternative therapies besides statins that people might consider?
There is no reason for healthy people to take drugs, or anything else to prevent heart disease, as long as we do not know the very cause.
Don’t forget that people who die from a myocardial infarction have on average lived just as long as other people. In my talks I used to ask people, who put the same question to me, if they know a better way of dying?
What diet do you recommend people follow?
I do not give medical advice to people I haven’t seen and examined myself, and as I am retired, it means that I give no advice at all except to my family and nearest friends. I inform people by writing and lecturing. Then they have to decide themselves what to do.
In 20 years, do you expect changes in how we view heart disease, its causes and treatments?
I am confident that we will see a change in the next few years. There is a growing skepticism among medical scientists. What is happening in Sweden these days may hopefully inspire researchers in other countries to air their skepticism openly.
Recently, experts selected by WHO and FAO published a new report. Here the authors concluded that there was no satisfactory or reliable evidence to support the idea that saturated fat causes heart disease, or diabetes or obesity.
A revolutionary change of direction, you may say. However, they did not change their recommendations!
Together with Kilmer McCully, the discoverer of the association between homocysteine and atherosclerosis, I have presented another hypothesis (You can read that paper in its entirety at this link.)
We think this hypothesis is much more likely because we are able to explain the many observations that do not fit with the present one.
Finally, I assume that much of what I have mentioned here may seem incredible, but all the facts, including references to the scientific literature, are available in my new book Fat And Cholesterol Are GOOD For You!
About Uffe Ravnskov, MD, PhD:
Dr. Ravnskov graduated from the University of Copenhagen with an M.D in 1961.
1961-1967: Various appointments at surgical, roentgenological, neurological, pediatric and medical departments in Denmark and Sweden.
1968-1979: Various appointments at the Department of Nephrology, and the Department of Clinical Chemistry, University Hospital, Lund, Sweden.
1979-2000: A private practitioner and independent researcher, specializing in internal medicine and nephrology. Honored with the Skrabanek Award 1998, and author of: The Cholesterol Myths.
For more information, see Dr. Ravnskov's Web site:
http://www.ravnskov.nu/cholesterol.htm
Related Links:
FREE Special Report “The Low-Down on Cholesterol: Why You Need it –...
The Truth About Cholesterol-Lowering Drugs (Statins), Cholesterol a...
Why Low Cholesterol is NOT Good For You
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© Copyright 2009 Dr. Joseph Mercola. All Rights Reserved. This content may be copied in full, with copyright, contact, creation and information intact, without specific permission, when used only in a not-for-profit format. If any other use is desired, permission in writing from Dr. Mercola is required.- Ending the Cholesterol-Heart Disease... plzchuckle
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(NaturalNews) Why has there never been a record of cholesterol having blocked a vein in the body! What is it about arteries that makes cholesterol attach itself to their walls, while leaving the veins alone? It is really the sticky nature of cholesterol that is behind the blockage of healthy blood vessel walls?
The answers to these questions may surprise you. The body actually uses the lipoprotein cholesterol as a kind of bandage to cover abrasions and tears in damaged arterial walls just as it does it for any other wound. Cholesterol is nothing less than a life-saver. However, for the past thirty-eight years, this lipoprotein has been stigmatized to be the number one cause of deaths in the rich nations - heart disease.
This is how the theory goes: For reasons not really known, a form of cholesterol that has earned the name “bad” somehow increases in the bloodstream of millions of people today; it sticks to the walls of arteries, and eventually, it will starve the heart muscle of oxygen and nutrients. Accordingly, the masses are urged to reduce or ban cholesterol-containing fats from their diet so that they can live without the fear of arterial occlusion and dying from a heart attack.
The tremendous concern of being attacked by this “vicious” lipoprotein has finally led to innovative technologies that can even extract cholesterol from cheese, eggs, and sausages, thus making these “deadly” foods “consumer-safe.” Products that claim to be low in cholesterol, such as margarine and light-foods, have become a popular choice of “healthy eating.”
Cholesterol is Not the Culprit After All
But as INTERHEART and other studies have shown, cholesterol isn't a serious risk factor for heart disease at all. An earlier study sponsored by the German Ministry of Research and Technology showed that no exact link exists between food cholesterol and blood cholesterol. Even more surprising, in Japan, the cholesterol levels have risen during recent years, yet the number of heart attacks has dropped. The largest health study ever conducted on the risks of heart disease took place in China. Like so many similar studies, the Chinese study found no connection between heart disease and the consumption of animal fats.
In an 8-year long heart study, researchers observed 10,000 people with high cholesterol levels. Half of them received a best-selling statin drug. The other half were simply told to eat a normal diet and get enough exercise. The results stunned the researchers. Although the statin drug did indeed lower serum cholesterol, this had no impact whatsoever on death rate, non-fatal heart attacks and fatal arterial disease. In other words, the statin-users had zero advantage over those who received no treatment at all. However, they had just spent eight years taking a costly drug with hideous side effects - risking liver failure, muscle wasting, even sudden death. Lowering cholesterol either through drugs or low fat diets does not lower the risk of developing heart disease.
All the major European long-term cholesterol studies have confirmed that a low-fat diet did not reduce cholesterol levels by more than 4 percent, in most cases merely 1-2 percent. Since measurement mistakes are usually higher than 4 percent and cholesterol levels naturally increase by 20 percent in autumn and drop again during the wintertime, the anti-cholesterol campaigns since the late 1980s have been very misleading, to say the least. A more recent study from Denmark involving 20,000 men and women, in fact, demonstrated that most heart disease patients have normal cholesterol levels. The bottom line is that cholesterol hasn't been proved a risk factor for anything.
The current medical understanding of the cholesterol issue is more than incomplete. The argument that animal tests on rabbits have confirmed that fatty foods cause hardening of the arteries sounds convincing, but only when the following facts are omitted:
* Rabbits respond 3,000 times more sensitively to cholesterol than humans do.
* Rabbits, which are non-carnivorous animals by nature, are force-fed excessive quantities of egg yolk and brain for the sake of proving that cholesterol-containing foods are harmful.
* The DNA and enzyme systems of rabbits are not designed for consumption of fatty foods, and if given a choice, these animals would never eat eggs or brains.
It is obvious that the arteries of these animals have only an extremely limited ability to respond to the damage caused by such unsuitable diets. For over three and half decades, Western civilization assumed that animal fats were the main cause of dietary heart disease. This misinformation is highlighted by the fact that heart attacks began to rise when consumption of animal fats actually decreased. This was verified by British research, which revealed that those areas in the U.K. where people consumed more margarine and less butter had the highest numbers of heart attacks. Further studies revealed that heart attack patients had consumed the least amounts of animal fats.
In this context, it is important to differentiate between processed and unprocessed fats. It has been discovered that people who died from a heart attack were found to have many more of the harmful fatty acids derived from the partially hydrogenated vegetable oils in their fat tissue than those who survived. These so-called "faulty" fats (trans-fatty acids) envelop and congest the membranes of cells, including those that make up the heart and coronary arteries. This practically starves the cells of oxygen, nutrients, and water, and eventually kills them.
In another more comprehensive study, 85,000 nurses working in American hospitals observed a higher risk for heart disease in patients who consumed margarine, crisps, potato chips, biscuits, cookies, cakes, and white bread, all of which contain trans fats.
Eating margarine can increase heart disease in women by 53 percent over eating the same amount of butter, according to a recent Harvard Medical Study. While actually increasing LDL cholesterol, margarine lowers the beneficial HDL cholesterol. It also increases the risk of cancers up to five times. Margarine suppresses both the immune response and insulin response. This highly processed and artificial product is practically resistant to destruction, being one molecule away from plastic. Flies, bacteria, fungi, etc. won't go near it because it has no nutritional value and cannot be broken down by them. It can last for years, not just outside the body, but inside as well.
It is very apparent that eating damaged, rancid fats or trans-fats can destroy any healthy organism and should be avoided by anyone. In 2007 New York City banned the use of trans fats in its restaurants; however, the trans fats are merely being replaced with new artificial fats that have the same or worse effects.
Healthy Today - Sick Tomorrow
Unfortunately, high cholesterol (hypercholesterolemia) has become the dominating health concern of the 21st century. It is actually an invented disease that doesn't show up as one. Even the healthiest people may have elevated serum cholesterol and yet their health remains perfect. But they are instantly turned into patients when a routine blood test reveals that they have a "cholesterol problem."
Since feeling good is actually a symptom of high cholesterol, the cholesterol issue has confused millions of people. To be DE CLAREd sick when you actually feel great is a hard nut to swallow. So it may take a lot of effort on behalf of a practicing physician to convince his patients that they are sick and need to take one or more expensive drugs for the rest of their lives. These healthy individuals may become depressed when they are being told they will need to take potentially harmful drugs to lower their cholesterol levels on a long-term, daily basis. When they also learn that they will require regular checkups and blood tests, their worry-free, good life is now over.
These doctors cannot be blamed for the blunder of converting healthy people into patients. Behind them stands the full force of the U.S. government, the media, the medical establishment, agencies, and of course, the pharmaceutical companies. All of them have collaborated to create relentless pressure in disseminating the cholesterol myth and convincing the population that high cholesterol is its number one enemy. We are told that we need to combat it by all means possible to keep us safe from the dreadful consequences of hypercholesterolemia.
The definition of a "healthy" level of cholesterol has been repeatedly adjusted during the past 30 years, which certainly does not give me much confidence in a system of medicine that professes to be founded on sound scientific principles. In the early days of measuring cholesterol levels, a person at risk was any middle-aged man whose cholesterol was over 240 and possessed other risk factors, such as smoking or being overweight.
After the adjustment of parameters during the Cholesterol Consensus Conference in 1984, the population was hit by a shock wave. Now, anyone (male or female) with overall cholesterol readings of 200 mg percent (200mg per 100 ml) could receive the dreaded diagnosis and a prescription for pills. The claim that 200 blood serum cholesterol is normal and everything above is dangerous was scientifically unfounded, though. At least, this was the consensus of all the major cholesterol studies. In fact, a report in a 1995 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association showed no evidence linking high cholesterol levels in women with heart conditions later in life.
Although it is considered completely normal for a 55-year-old woman to have a cholesterol level of 260 mg percent, most women that age are not told about this. Also healthy employees are found to have an average of 250 mg percent with high fluctuations in both directions.
The lack of evidence linking elevated cholesterol with increased risk of heart disease, however, didn't stop the brainwashing of the masses. In the U.S. 84 percent of all men and 93 percent of all women aged 50-59 with high cholesterol levels were suddenly told they needed treatment for heart disease. The totally unproved but aggressively promoted cholesterol theories turned most of us into patients for a disease that we probably will never develop. Fortunately, not everyone has followed the advice to have their cholesterol levels checked but, unfortunately, millions of people have fallen into the trap of misinformation.
To make matters worse, the official, acceptable cholesterol level has now been moved down to 180. If you have already had one heart attack, your cardiologist will tell you to take cholesterol-lowering statins even if your cholesterol is very low. From the viewpoint of conventional medicine, having a heart attack implies that your cholesterol must be too high. Hence you are being sentenced to a lifetime of statins and a boring low-fat diet. But even if you have not experienced any heart trouble yet, you are already being considered for possible treatment.
Since so many children now show signs of elevated cholesterol, we have a whole new generation of candidates for medical treatment. So yes, current edicts stipulate cholesterol testing and treatment for young adults and even children! The statin drugs that doctors use to push cholesterol levels down are LIPITOR (atorvastatin), Zocor (simvastatin), Mevacor (lovastatin), and Pravachol (pravastatin). If you decide to follow your doctor's advice and take one of these drugs, make certain to read the list of side effects so that you know the risks you are taking.
If you want to obtain objective and untainted information on cholesterol, agencies like the National Institutes of Health and the American College of Cardiology are certainly not the places from which to obtain it. Until recently, they wanted you to keep your overall cholesterol level below 150. Then, in 2001, they finally admitted that measuring overall cholesterol levels makes no sense at all, so they began recommending an LDL level below 100. Now their aim is to keep LDL lower than 70. Every time they lower the target, the number of "patients" requiring treatment jumps dramatically, much to the benefit of the drug producers. Being officially backed by these agencies, doctors feel motivated, if not obliged, to prescribe these expensive drugs to their new patients.
The extensive promotional campaigns by the pharmaceutical giants have already brainwashed the masses to believe they need these drugs to be safe from sudden heart attack. Even if a doctor knows the truth about the cholesterol deception, these anxious patients will demand a prescription from him. This is not just affecting their health, but everyone's economic future. The massive sales of these best-selling drugs of all time drive up health care costs to levels that undermine economic growth and make basic health care unaffordable to an ever-increasing number of people. The masses have been so brainwashed with misinformation that this lurking financial crisis doesn't seem to be their immediate concern.
In 2004, there were already 36 million statin candidates in the U.S., with 16 million using LIPITOR alone. When the official LDL target level drops to 70, another 5 million people will be eligible for their use. At the consumer markup price of $272.37 and an actual cost of $5.80 for a month supply of LIPITOR, you can understand the incentive that the pharmaceutical industry has to push their products and make them a mass commodity.
Excerpted from Chapter 9 of Timeless Secrets of Health and Rejuvenation by Andreas Moritz , (www.ener-chi.com) or (www.amazon.com) . Check out the book for more information about statins, cholesterol and heart disease, or any of the related topics listed below
* The Secret Cause Of Heart Disease - And Why It’s So Easily Reversed
* The Beginning Stages Of Heart Disease
* Major Contributing Factors
* Meat Consumption And Heart Disease
* Yes, Your Body Can Store Protein!
* Protein Storage - A Time Bomb
* The Revealing Role Of Homocysteine
* C-Reactive Protein Reveals The Truth
* How And Why Heart Attacks Really Occur
* Heart Attacks Can Occur In A Number Of Ways:
1) New Studies Question Value Of Opening Arteries
2) Risk Indications Of A Heart Attack
3) What Statins May Do To You!
4) But Doesn’t Aspirin Protect Against Heart Disease?
5) Dangers Of Low Cholesterol
6) Cholesterol - Your Life And Blood
7) When Cholesterol Signals SOS
8) Balancing Cholesterol Levels Naturally
9) Overcoming Heart Disease - Two Encouraging Stories
10) Non-Dietary Causes Of Heart Disease.
11) A Lacking Social Support System
12) Greatest Risk Factors: Job Satisfaction And Happiness Rating
13) Your Need To Love
14) What A Loving Spouse Can Do
15) The Healing Power Of “Loving Touch”
About the author
Andreas Moritz is a medical intuitive; a practitioner of Ayurveda, iridology, shiatsu, and vibrational medicine; a writer; and an artist. He is the author of The Amazing Liver and Gallbladder Flush, Timeless Secrets of Health and Rejuvenation, Lifting the Veil of Duality, Cancer Is Not a Disease, It’s Time to Come Alive, Heart Disease No More, Diabetes No More, Simple Steps to Total Health, Diabetes—No More, Ending the AIDS Myth and Heal Yourself with Sunlight. For more information, visit the author’s website (www.ener-chi.com).
Ending the Cholesterol-Heart Disease Myth
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Editor’s note: The following article was based on a recent article written by John Tierney in the New York Times. The article appeared as a response to a recent study that demonstrated that a low-carb diet was more effective than either a low-fat or Mediterranean diet in reducing excess weight and improving blood cholesterol levels. This study is just one of many that have appeared in medical journals over the past few years, all of which produced similar results.
Good News on Saturated Fat
Should we be reconsidering the conventional wisdom on saturated fat? Yes, according to Gary Taubes’s interpretation of the new report in The New England Journal of Medicine (July, 17, 2008) on a two-year diet experiment in Israel.
The Israeli researchers found that people on a calorie restricted low-fat diet lost less weight (7 pounds) than those who ate a calorie restricted Mediterranean diet (10 pounds) or a non-calorie restricted low-carbohydrate diet (12 pounds). (Note that both the low-fat and Mediterranean diet groups were limited on their total calorie consumption, but the low-carb group were allowed to eat their full.)
This study set off a debate on whether the low-carb diet is better than the other diets. Many people claimed the difference in weight loss was insignificant and that the low-carbohydrate diet isn’t really any better than the other two. However if you look at the data, there is a completely different story being told. Those in low-carbohydrate diet group lost almost twice as much as those in the low-fat group and they did it without dieting! They were able to eat as much as they wanted. The low-fat group, on the other hand, had to restrict their calorie intake. So on a weight loss standpoint there really is no comparison between the three diets. Even the Mediterranean dieters had to restrict their calorie intake and still didn’t fair a well as the low-carbers.
Gary Taubes offes further insight by focusing on another aspect of the study: perhaps the best news yet about saturated fat. Mr. Taubes states his book Good Calories, Bad Calories, the medical establishment originally warned people to avoid all kinds of fat, but subsequent studies kept failing to produce evidence of the benefits of a low-fat diet. Then the supposed experts said the villain wasn’t just any fat but specifically saturated fat. But now their recommendations are being undermined yet again by research, Mr. Taubes says. Here’s his take on the new experiment and a series of similar trials:
These trials are fundamentally tests of the hypothesis that saturated fat is bad for cholesterol and bad for the heart. They’re not just about which diet works best for weight loss or is healthiest, but what constitutes a healthy diet, period. Specifically, these low-fat/low-carb diet trials, of which there are now more than half a dozen, test American Heart Association (A.H.A.) relatively low-fat diets against Atkins-like high-saturated-fat diets.
In this last test, the A.H.A. diet was about 30 percent calories from fat, less than 10 percent calories from saturated fat; the low-carb diet was almost 40 percent calories from fat, around 12.5 percent saturated fat. In this particular trial, as in all of them so far, the high-saturated-fat diet (low-carb or Atkins-like) resulted in the best improvement in cholesterol profile — total cholesterol/H.D.L. In this Israeli trial, the high-saturated-fat diet reduced L.D.L. at least as well as the did the A.H.A. relatively low-fat diet, the fundamental purpose of which is to lower L.D.L. by reducing the saturated fat content.
So here’s the simple question and the point: how can saturated fat be bad for us if a high saturated fat diet lowers L.D.L. at least as well as a diet that has 20 to 25 percent less saturated fat?
It could be argued (and probably will be) that the effect of the saturated fat is confounded by the reduction in calories, but the A.H.A. diet also reduces calories and in fact specifies caloric reduction while the low-carb diet does not. It will also be argued, as Dean Ornish does, that the source of the saturated fat was not necessarily meat or bacon, but beans or other healthy sources.
But the nutritional reason why meat has been vilified over the years, is that it’s a source of unhealthy saturated fat. It’s not that meat per se is bad — unless you buy the colon cancer evidence, which has always seemed dubious — it’s that the saturated fat in meat makes it bad. So the argument about the source of the saturated fat is irrelevant.
The question hinges on whether saturated fat raises cholesterol and causes heart disease. One way or the other this trial is a test of that hypothesis. It’s arguably the best such trial ever done and the most rigorous. To me that’s always been the story. If saturated fat is bad for us, then these trials should demonstrate it. They imply the opposite.
Why does the A.H.A. continue to insist that saturated fat should be avoided, if these trials repeatedly show that high saturated fat diets lead to better cholesterol profiles than low-saturated fat diets? And how many of these trials have to be done before the National Institutes of Health or some other august institution in this business re-assesses this question? After all, the reason the food guide pyramid suggests we eat things like butter and lard and meats sparingly (and puts them high up in the pyramid) is that they contain saturated fat. This is also the reason that the A.H.A. wants to lower even further what’s considered the safe limit for saturated fats in the diet.
Is Mr. Taubes right? If eating more saturated fat improved the dieters’ cholesterol profile (while also enabling them to lose weight even though their calories were not restricted), should the federal government and the American Heart Association stop warning people about saturated fats?
Editors note:
Just weeks before the above article appeared in the New York Times the American Academy of Pediatrics released its new guidelines on cholesterol, recommending low-fat diets for children as young a 1year and suggesting children be started on cholesterol-lowering drugs as early a 8 years of age to treat and prevent obesity and high cholesterol.
Too often the medical approach is to treat people with drugs, and if that doesn’t work give them more drugs, and if the drugs still don’t work, then put people on drugs at earlier and earlier ages. We have been trying the low-fat, low-cholesterol approach to weight loss, heart disease, and overall health for over a quarter of a century now with dismal results. We are getting fatter and cholesterol rates are as high as ever. Study after study shows that low-carb, moderate to high fat diets are superior for overall health and weight loss. If low-fat, low-saturated fat, and low-cholesterol diets are inferior to low-carbohydrate, high-saturated fat, and high-cholesterol diet, as the studies are saying, why is the American Academy of Pediatrics pushing to put children on drugs? Is there a reason why they would recommend drugs over a simple proven dietary approach? Who stands to benefit most from drugging our children? Obviously, the answer to that question is the drug companies and their supporters.
To read this article or subscribe to Healthy Ways Newsletter: click here
Copyright © 2008, Bruce Fife. All rights reserved.
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The Failure of Statins to Improve Ca... plzchuckle
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A recent meta-analysis has demonstrated that taking statin drugs is associated with excess risk of developing diabetes.
Researchers looked at five different clinical trials that together examined more than 32,000 people. They found that the higher the dosage of statin drugs
being taken, the greater the diabetes risk.
According to the study, as reported by Green Med Info:
"In a pooled analysis of data from 5 statin trials, intensive-dose statin therapy was associated with an increased risk of new-onset diabetes
compared with moderate-dose statin therapy."
Dr. Mercola's Comments:
This recent meta-analysis of five different drug trials adds further
credence to suspicions that statins may be contributing to the current epidemic of adult-onset diabetes. Statins, as most of
you probably know, are the most popular cholesterol-lowering drugs available today.
They're primarily thought of as "preventive medicine" to reduce your risk of heart disease. Many doctors also prescribe them if
you have elevated C reactive protein (an indication that you have chronic inflammation in your body), and they're even promoted
for kids as young as eight years old!
The fact that statin drugs cause side effects is well established—there are some
900 studies proving their adverse effects
, which run the gamut from muscle problems to
increased cancer risk
. But as we're now starting to discover, statins may also cause diabetes...
Statins Increase Risk of Diabetes Onset, Researchers Find
The meta-analysis, published in JAMA in June, concluded that
those taking higher doses of statins were at increased risk of diabetes compared to those taking moderate doses. What this
means is that the higher your dose, the higher your risk of developing diabetes.
The "number needed to harm" for intensive-dose statin therapy was 498 for new-onset diabetes—that's the number of people
who need to take the drug in order for one person to develop diabetes. In even simpler terms, one out of every 498 people
who are on a high-dose statin regimen will develop diabetes. (The lower the "number needed to harm," the greater the risk
factor is.)
(As a side note, the "number needed to treat" per year for intensive-dose statins was 155 for cardiovascular events. This
means that 155 people have to take the drug in order to prevent one person from having a cardiovascular event.)
The following scientific reviews also reached the conclusion that statin use is associated with increased incidence of
new-onset diabetes:
A
2010 meta-analysis of 13 statin trials
, consisting of 91,140 participants, found that statin therapy was associated with a 9 percent increased risk for
incident diabetes. Here, the number needed to harm was 255 over four years, meaning for every 255 people on the drug,
one developed diabetes as a result of the drug in that period of time.
In this
>
2009 study
, statin use was associated with a rise of fasting plasma glucose in patients with and without diabetes, independently
of other factors such as age, and use of aspirin, β-blockers, or angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors. The study
included data from more than 345,400 patients over a period of two years.
On average, statins increased fasting plasma glucose in non-diabetic statin users by 7 mg/dL, and in diabetics, statins
increased glucose levels by 39 mg/dL.
How Do Statins Cause Diabetes?
Statins appear to provoke diabetes through a few different mechanisms. The most important reason is that they increase your
insulin levels, which can be extremely harmful to your health.
While you need some insulin to maintain your blood glucose levels, elevated insulin levels causes chronic inflammation in
your body, and inflammation is the hallmark of most chronic diseases. In fact, elevated insulin levels lead to heart
disease, which, ironically, is the primary reason for taking a cholesterol-reducing drug in the first place! It can also
promote belly fat, high blood pressure, heart attacks, chronic fatigue, thyroid disruption, and diseases like Parkinson's,
Alzheimer's, and cancer.
Secondly, statins increase your diabetes risk by raising your blood sugar. When you eat a meal that contains starches and
sugar, some of the excess Sugar goes to your liver, which then stores it away as cholesterol and triglycerides. Statins
work by preventing your liver from making cholesterol. As a result, your liver returns the Sugar to your bloodstream, which
raises your blood Sugar levels.
Statins also rob your body of certain valuable nutrients, which can also impact your blood sugar levels. Two nutrients in
particular, vitamin D and CoQ10, are both needed to maintain ideal blood glucose levels.
Now, it's important to realize that drug-induced diabetes and genuine type 2 diabetes are not necessarily identical.
If you're on a statin drug and find that your blood glucose is elevated, it's possible that what you have is just
hyperglycemia—a side effect, and the result of your medication. Unfortunately, many doctors will at that point mistakenly
diagnose you with "type 2 diabetes," and possibly prescribe another drug, when all you may need to do is simply discontinue
the statin in order for your blood glucose levels to revert back to normal. So if friends or loved ones you know are on a
statin (and one in four Americans over 45 are) and they are told they have diabetes, please do them a favor and tell them
about the information in this article.
Beware: Statins Decimate Health-Promoting Nutrients
It's still uncertain whether statins actually deplete your body of vitamin D, but they do reduce your body's
natural ability to create active vitamin D (1,25-dihydroxycholecalciferol). This is the natural outcome of the
drug's cholesterol-reducing ability, because you need cholesterol to make vitamin D! It's the raw material your
body uses for vitamin D conversion after you've exposed your skin to sunlight.
It's also well-documented that vitamin D improves insulin resistance, so needless to say, when you take a statin drug, you
forfeit this 'built-in' health-promoting mechanism.
Additionally, statins suppress your natural
coenzyme Q10
; also called "ubiquinol" in its active form. Produced mainly in your liver, it makes energy for every cell in your body,
and it too plays a role in maintaining blood glucose. Depleting CoQ10 also increases your risk for heart failure, high
blood pressure, and heart disease. Moreover, CoQ10 protects your body from oxidative stress, a strong contributing factor
in the development of diabetes, metabolic syndrome and heart attacks.
That said, if you absolutely have to take a statin drug, you must make sure to also take ubiquinol in order to prevent
CoQ10 deficiency and help protect against cellular damage.
Other Potential Side Effects of Statins
Aside from what I've already covered above, statin drugs are associated with a rather extensive list of harmful side
effects, including:
Weakness
Polyneuropathy (nerve damage in the hands and feet)
Acidosis
Dysfunction of the pancreas
Muscle aches and pains
Anemia
Sexual dysfunction
Cataracts
Rhabdomyolysis, a serious degenerative muscle tissue condition
Potential increase in liver enzymes so patients must be monitored for normal liver function
Suppressed immune function
>
Increased cancer risk
Do You Really Need a Statin Drug?
That these drugs have dominated the market the way they have is a testimony to the power of marketing, corruption and
massive conflict of interest, because the odds are very high— greater than 100 to 1—that if you're taking a statin, you do
NOT actually need it. It's clearly one of the most over-prescribed drugs there are. There's only one subgroup of people
that might benefit from this drug and that's those born with a genetic defect called
familial hypercholesterolemia
, which makes them resistant to traditional measures of normalizing cholesterol.
In order to see past the propaganda, you must first understand that
>
cholesterol is NOT the cause of heart disease
. And if your physician is urging you to check your total cholesterol, then you should know that this test will tell you
virtually nothing about your risk of heart disease, unless it is 330 or higher or you have a seriously distorted
HDL/Cholesterol ratio
.
Your body needs cholesterol. It's important in the production of your cell membranes, hormones, vitamin D and bile
acids that help you to digest fat. Cholesterol also helps your brain form memories, and is vital to your neurological
function. There is strong evidence that having
>
too little cholesterol
increases your risk for cancer, memory loss, Parkinson's disease, hormonal imbalances, stroke, depression, suicide, and
violent behavior.
The following ratios are FAR more potent indicators for heart disease, and are the ones you want to keep an eye on:
HDL/Total Cholesterol Ratio: Should ideally be above 24 percent. If below 10 percent, you have a significantly elevated
risk for heart disease.
Triglyceride/HDL Ratio: Should be below 2.
I have seen people with total cholesterol levels over 250 who were actually at low risk for heart disease due to their
elevated HDL (so-called "good" cholesterol) levels. Conversely, I have seen many people with cholesterol levels under 200
who had a very high risk of heart disease, based on their low HDL.
How to Optimize Your Cholesterol Levels Without a Drug
It's truly unfortunate that the drug industry's media- and medical industry manipulation has been so successful in
brainwashing both doctors and unsuspecting patients into taking these harmful drugs when so few people actually need them.
Not to mention the fact that the most effective way to optimize your cholesterol profile and prevent heart disease is via
diet and exercise.
It's actually quite simple too. Seventy-five percent of your cholesterol is produced by your liver, which is influenced by
your insulin levels.
Therefore, if you optimize your insulin level, you will automatically optimize your cholesterol and reduce your risk of
both diabetes and heart disease. As you've just learned, taking a statin drug can actually increase your risk of
both of these diseases. And remember the "number needed to treat" that I mentioned earlier; in order to prevent a
cardiovascular event in just one person, 155 people must be treated with the drug—all of them taking the risk of
experiencing a potentially serious side effect... So, before you agree to take a statin drug, please evaluate the risks and
benefits.
What are the chances you will be in the minority who will benefit? And what are your chances of suffering a potentially
devastating side effect? Make a conscious, informed decision, and keep track of any side effects once you start taking the
drug!
Also know that there are other ways to improve your cholesterol that do not put your health at risk. My primary
recommendations for safely regulating your cholesterol include:
Reduce, with the plan of eliminating grains and fructose from your diet. This is the number one way to optimize your
insulin levels, which will have a positive effect on not just your cholesterol, but also reduces your risk of diabetes
and heart disease, and most other chronic diseases. Use my Nutrition Plan to help you determine the ideal diet for
you, and consume a
good portion of your food raw
.
Get plenty of high quality,
>
animal-based omega 3 fats
, such as krill oil, and reduce your consumption of damaged omega-6 fats (trans fats, vegetable oils) to balance out
your omega-3 to omega-6 ratio.
Include heart-healthy foods in your diet, such as olive oil, coconut and coconut oil, organic raw dairy products and
eggs, avocados, raw nuts and seeds, and organic grass-fed meats.
Exercise daily. Make sure you incorporate
>
peak fitness exercises
, which also optimizes your human growth hormone (HGH) production.
Avoid smoking or drinking alcohol excessively.
Be sure to get plenty of
good, restorative sleep
.
Unlike statin drugs, which lower your cholesterol at the expense of your health, these lifestyle strategies represent a
holistic approach that will benefit your overall health—which includes optimal insulin levels and a healthy cardiovascular
system.
Read this article and/or sign up for Dr. Mercola's FREE NewsLetter click here.
© Copyright 2010 Dr. Joseph Mercola. All Rights Reserved.
This content may be copied in full, with copyright, contact, creation and information intact, without specific permission, when used only in a not-for-profit format.
- The Dark Side of Statin Drugs plzchuckle
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This is a reply to # 2,126,877
The blood cholesterol theory of heart disease is grossly exaggerated. The truth is that “blood cholesterol is only weakly associated with heart disease and between 1945 and 1995 not a single study presented evidence that reducing cholesterol blood levels would lower overall death rate” while several studies showed that certain medications for lowering blood cholesterol levels actually increased overall death rates.
Source: Heart Frauds: Uncovering the Biggest Health Scam in History by Charles T. McGee, M.D. (HealthWise Books, 2001)
http://www.1healthyworld.com/
The Health Plus Letter, August 5, 2003, Vol. 1, No. 5. Copyright © 2003 by Larry Trivieri, Jr. All rights reserved. - High Cholesterol Is Not Bad plzchuckle
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MoreThis is a reply to # 2,126,877
http://www.rawlifehealthshow.com Most people do not understand cholesterol and how it works. Dr. Pompa explains it very well in this video.
- Heart Attacks and Strokes Caused by ... plzchuckle
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This is a reply to # 2,126,877
Longtime readers of my health and wellness newsletters know I've been warning that 100 percent of ALL people who have a heart attacks or strokes do not have elevated cholesterol levels - they have elevated acid levels!
A study published this past week not only confirms my theory, but indicates that almost 75 percent of people hospitalized with a heart attack or stroke have had cholesterol levels that were within current normal cholesterol guidelines.
The alleged link between high cholesterol levels and heart attack and stroke risk has been the main support for the dietary cholesterol theory. But I have known for over a decade that 50 percent of people who have a heart attack do not have elevated cholesterol levels, and the new study adds even more proof to my theory.
So what is the real cause? Can you spell ACID!
The big pharmaceutical companies all advocate the use of statin drugs such as Lipitor, Zocor, and Crestor, to lower cholesterol. However, results from the study most commonly cited by statin proponents shows that people with the highest LDL cholesterol levels (the so-called "bad" cholesterol that is saving your life) wound up with no better results from taking statins than those with lower blood cholesterol levels. This indicated that the reduction of LDL cholesterol by the statin drug did not predict a person's risk of coronary heart disease.
There is compelling and overwhelming evidence to suggest that dietary and metabolic acid that causes irritation, inflammation, ulceration and degeneration is seen in every case of heart attack and stroke and is the fundamental cause of high cholesterol, atherosclerosis, heart attack and stroke.
Cell-based experiments and studies on both humans and animals all confirm this -- and the evidence is growing. For in-depth information, read my newsletter called "Symptoms Confused As Disease," at:
http://articlesofhealth.blogspot.com/2008/06/symptom-and-disease-co...
One recent study stated it this way: Dietary and metabolic acid that causes inflammation plays a central role at every stage of atherosclerosis, from beginning to end. And the greater the acid the greater the inflammation, the more rapidly atherosclerosis advances. Fortunately, there are natural substances, including mineral salts and other natural substances such as chlorophyll that reduces dietary and metabolic acid that causes inflammation or Stage 4 acidosis that causes heart disease and stroke. For a more in-depth look at the causes of acid based inflammation, its relationship to atherosclerosis, and natural substances for a healthy heart, go to:
http://articlesofhealth.blogspot.com/2009/01/acids-cause-heart-atta...
Unfortunately, all heart attack and strokes are caused by an acidic lifestyle and diet, such as in the tragic case of journalist Tim Russert. He had very little warning and he thought he was following all the steps necessary to avoid sudden cardiac death (SCD) or I eat too much acidic shi@ Dis-ease (ASD). Find out what makes you vulnerable to SCD or ASD, including acidic health conditions such as diabetes, MS, and Cancer and what you can do to keep from becoming a statistic, by reading my special newsletter "The Most Important Article I Have Ever Written." Go here for further information.
http://articlesofhealth.blogspot.com/2008/02/cause-and-cure-for-all...
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Visit our website at:
www.phmiracleliving.com
To learn more about the Science of Dr. Robert and Shelley Young go to:
www.articlesofhealth.blogspot.com
'Miracles happen not in opposition to nature, but in opposition to what we know of nature.' St. Augustine
'Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic' ....Arthur C. Clarke
'There are only two ways to live your life. One, is as though there are no miracles. The other is as though everything is a miracle.' Albert Einstein
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http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=691213155- Acids Cause Heart Attacks and Stroke... plzchuckle
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This is a reply to # 2,126,979
A new national study has shown that nearly 75 percent of all patients hospitalized for a heart attack or stroke had normal or low cholesterol levels. According to current savants this would indicate they were not at high risk for a cardiovascular event, according to current national cholesterol guidelines.
Specifically, these patients had low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol levels that met current guidelines, and close to half had LDL levels classified in guidelines as optimal (less than 100 mg/dL).
According to Dr. Robert O. Young, Director of the pH Miracle Living Center, "if you have normal or low blood cholesterol and are living and acidic lifestyle and diet you are at a higher risk for a stroke or heart attack than someone with cholesterol over 300 mg/dl."
"High blood cholesterol indicates that the body is trying to buffer excess dietary and/or metabolic acid. This is a good thing. Cholesterol is good not bad. Acid is bad and the cause of stroke and heart attacks," states Dr. Young.
"Almost 75 percent of heart attack patients fell within recommended targets for LDL cholesterol, demonstrating that the current guidelines may not be low enough to cut heart attack risk in most who could benefit," said Dr. Gregg C. Fonarow, Eliot Corday Professor of Cardiovascular Medicine and Science at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and the study's principal investigator.
"Unfortunately, Dr. Fonarow and Cordsay just don't get it. Cholesterol is not the problem. The problem is a person's acidic lifestyle and dietary choices," states Dr. Young.
While the risk of cardiovascular events increases substantially with LDL levels above 40-60 mg/dL, current national cholesterol guidelines consider LDL levels less than 100-130 mg/dL acceptable for many individuals. The guidelines are thus not effectively identifying the majority of individuals who will develop fatal and non-fatal cardiovascular events, according to the study's authors.
"Persons who are at risk for a heart attack or stroke are persons who live an acidic lifestyle and diet, such as:
1) Lack of adequate exercise. You should exercise every day for at least 1 hour. And you should be sweating which helps to remove dietary and metabolic acids from the blood and tissues.
2) Eating animal proteins. Cut out all animal proteins for plant proteins, such as Hemp meal or protein. Hemp protein has twice the protein content than animal protein.
3) Eating dairy products. There are no substitutes for dairy products.
4) Vinegar. Never use it. IT is poisonous!
5) Mushrooms and algae. They break the body down and recycle it back to the earth.
6) Corn, corn starch and corn syrup. It is a strong acid and should never be consumed!
7) Peanuts. They are full of mold.
8) Eggs. Eggs are for creating a baby chick not for eating. They are full of bacteria. Approximately 38,000,000 million per egg. Eggs are dirty and filthy of the blood and tissues. They also activate the immune system to clean up the bloody mess.
9) Chocolate. Two acids - theobromine and methylbromine - they both kill.
10) Any form of Sugar with the last 3 letters of "ose' or "tol." For example, sucrose or maltose, or Xylitol or Mannitol. All Sugar in all of its forms is toxic to the body and should never be consumed.
These are the top ten acidic food choices that destroy a body and lead to heart attack or stroke," states Dr. Young.
Researchers also found that more than half of patients hospitalized for a heart attack had poor high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol levels, according to national guidelines.
"If you want to be healthy you need healthy fats. The healthiest of all the fats are the polyunsaturated Omega 3's found in flax seed and hemp seed. I suggest eating at least 2 to 3 ounces of healthy oil or fat a day. This helps to increase the high-density lipoproteins," states Dr. Young.
Published in the January issue of the American Heart Journal, the study suggests that lowering guideline targets for LDL cholesterol for those at risk for cardiovascular disease, as well as developing better treatments to raise HDL cholesterol, may help reduce the number of patients hospitalized for heart attack in the future.
"Sounds like good advise from the allopathic point of view but is is way off the target. The key is to decrease acidic foods and drinks and increase exercise, alkaline foods and drinks, especially the long chain fats or Omega 3's," states Dr. Young.
Researchers analyzed data from 136,905 patients hospitalized for a heart attack nationwide between 2000 and 2006 whose lipid levels upon hospital admission were documented. This accounted for 59 percent of total hospital admissions for heart attack at participating hospitals during the study period.
Among individuals without any prior cardiovascular disease or diabetes, 72.1 percent had admission LDL levels less than 130 mg/dL, which is the current LDL cholesterol target for this population. Thus, the vast majority of individuals having their first heart attack would not have been targeted for effective preventative treatments based on the criteria used in the current guidelines.
The team also found that half of the patients with a history of heart disease had LDL cholesterol levels lower than 100 mg/dL, and 17.6 percent of patients had LDL levels below 70 mg/dL, which are guideline targets for LDL cholesterol in those at fair risk and at high risk for cardiovascular disease, respectively.
The study also showed that HDL cholesterol, or "good cholesterol," levels have dropped in patients hospitalized for heart attack over the past few years, possibly due to increasing rates of obesity, insulin resistance and diabetes.
Researchers found that 54.6 percent of patients had HDL levels below 40 mg/dL. Developing more effective treatments to boost HDL levels may help reduce the number of patients hospitalized for heart attacks, according to the authors.
"We found that less than 2 percent of heart attack patients had both ideal LDL and HDL cholesterol levels, so there is room for improvement," said Fonarow.
Fonarow said that only 59 percent of patients in the database had their lipid levels checked upon admission, which should be increased, since these early measurements can often help guide treatment decisions.
He also noted that only 21 percent of patients in the study were taking lipid-lowering medications before admission, despite almost half having a prior history of cardiovascular events, which would prompt treatment.
"Bottom line, heart attacks and strokes are caused by acidic lifestyles and diets. If you want to reduce the risk for heart attack and stroke the focused needs to be placed on the personal lifestyle and dietary choice - and that choice needs to move to a more alkaline lifestyle and diet," states Dr. Young.
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- Acids Cause Heart Attacks and Stroke... plzchuckle
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- High Cholesterol Is Not Bad plzchuckle
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http://www.rawlifehealthshow.com Most people do not understand cholesterol and how it works. Dr. Pompa explains it very well in this video.
- Johnny Bowden's Cholesterol Facts plzchuckle
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(NaturalNews) I’m sure you’ve seen the ads. Dr. Robert Jarvik, best known for the artificial heart he pioneered more than 25 years ago, is rowing a one-man racing shell across a mountain lake, looking like the picture of health. “When diet and exercise aren’t enough”, Dr. Jarvik says solemnly, “adding Lipitor significantly lowers cholesterol”.
The implication is clear. This stuff’s got to be good. Here’s one of the big guns in the area of heart medicine - he invented the artificial heart for goodness sake - endorsing it. He uses it himself and he’s rowing away like an athlete half his age. It’s got to be good, right?
Shades of those old late night infomercials for hair replacement - “I would not lie to you! I’m the president of the company!”
Well, it turns out that Jarvik doesn’t actually row. And he isn’t actually a cardiologist and currently isn’t even licensed to practice medicine. “He’s about as much an outdoorsman as Woody Allen” said his longtime collaborator, Dr. O. H. Frazier of the Texas Heart Institute.
OK, so they used a stunt double to sell the pill. Is that so bad?
Not by itself. But taken together with some other troubling information that was revealed recently, it might cause us to take a new look at the whole mania for lowering cholesterol.
Most people only care about lowering their cholesterol for one reason: they believe that doing so is going to make them live longer and reduce the risk for a heart attack. Otherwise why bother, right? So the recent trials on Vytorin - a new cholesterol medication - have something interesting to tell us.
Vytorin (which became famous for commercials which showed people who look similar to foods like banana cream pie and tacos) actually combines two drugs: Zocor, a top-selling statin (cholesterol lowering med) and Zetia, a drug that limits cholesterol’s absorption. The hope was that the combo med would be a blockbuster because it lowers cholesterol even more than either medication taken alone.
And it does.
Problem is, that’s all it does. The recent study that got headline attention showed that the new drug didn’t do a darn thing to slow the growth of arterial plaque. The decline in cholesterol level didn’t translate into any appreciable benefit if by benefit you mean living longer or avoiding heart disease.
Which might make you wonder.
Maybe, just maybe, we’ve been concentrating on the wrong thing. Maybe lowering cholesterol isn’t the be-all and end-all of a heart healthy lifestyle.
Remember, fully half of people with heart attacks have normal cholesterol. And half of the people with “elevated” cholesterol have perfectly fine tickers.
Emperor’s new clothes, anyone?
Trying to lower death rates and heart disease just by lowering cholesterol is like trying to reduce auto fatalities just by making stronger air bags. The air bag industry likes it; but it doesn’t touch the major risk factors for highway deaths, like drunk driving.
For a long time I’ve been part of the “International Network of Cholesterol Skeptics" who believe our collective emphasis on this one measurement is wrong-headed and not even based in good science. I’ve seen people with absolutely not a heart disease risk factor in sight be given Lipitor or Zocor because their total cholesterol was a measly 210. That is utterly ridiculous.
And by the way, there is not a shred, and I mean not a shred, of evidence that lowering LDL cholesterol does a thing for women. The only population it seems to help is middle aged men who have already had a heart attack.
We would be so much better off looking at blood measures like triglycerides, homocysteine, CRP (a measure of inflammation) and the ratio of triglycerides to HDL cholesterol, a ratio which, in a published article in the journal Circulation, was found to predict heart disease 16 times better than cholesterol. To find your ratio take your triglycerides and divide by your HDL cholesterol. For example if you’ve got triglycerides of 100 and HDL cholesterol of 50, your ratio is 2, which is a vanishingly low level of risk. Five, on the other hand is high risk. You can lower your ratio simply by bringing down your triglycerides, something relatively easy to do with a lower carb, no-sugar diet!
And while I’m ranting, let me say one more thing about statin drugs, which, by the way, are inching close to being a 20 billion dollar a year industry, and that's just for the two top selling cholesterol-lowering drugs.
Statin drugs probably do some good but not because they lower cholesterol.
Statin drugs lower inflammation, and that is something we should be concerned about. But saying they prevent heart attacks by lowering cholesterol is like saying aspirin prevents clotting because it gets rid of headaches.
And by the way, in case you’re interested, cholesterol is the parent molecule for your sex hormones, not to mention for vitamin D. And there are multiple dangers to lowering it too much, despite what the drug manufacturers would like you to believe.
Let’s start looking at the other risk factors for heart disease, like smoking, not exercising, not eating fish or fish oil, being overweight and stress. Remember, in the Nurses Health Study they got an 83% reduction in risk for heart disease just by following five simple lifestyle modifications: a healthy Diet (with fish), a healthy weight, no smoking, moderate alcohol and daily exercise.
Eighty three percent!
There’s not a drug on earth that can give you those results.
And by the way, Pfizer has pulled those ads with Dr. Jarvik.
About the author
Dr. Jonny Bowden (www.jonnybowden.com) is a board certified nutritionist, and nationally known speaker who has appeared on Fox News, CNN, MSNBC, ABC, NBC and CBS as a nutrition expert. His latest book is "The Most Effective Natural Cures on Earth"((http://www.amazon.com/Most-Effective-Na...). For more information, free audio courses and newsletter please visit (www.jonnybowden.com) .
Have You Seen Those Misleading Lipitor Ads? - Three Chinese Herbs could Put an End... plzchuckle
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(NaturalNews) The statin drug pushing scam is going for the throat with its all time lowest assault! It is becoming more and more evident that people of all ages are being lied to day after day by doctors as a way to push the deadly protocol of Big Pharma. If you believe all the hype about statins from pharma reps and TV commercials then you will believe that the whole reason our livers make cholesterol is simply to give us a heart attack sometime down the road! That is just about exactly what they tell you.
LDL or so called "bad cholesterol" is not a type of cholesterol at all. It is in fact a protein. Low density lipoprotein to be exact. LDL is a binding protein that is necessary to carry this cholesterol to the body as needed. (Because the waxy cholesterol is not soluble in our watery blood)
HDL is another (high density) protein designed to help carry the used-up cholesterol back to the liver (Not to "get rid of" cholesterol as the pharma-medical system would have you believe but to recycle it so we can re-use it) The simple facts are we need all three! Cholesterol, LDL protein and HDL protein are all essential to good health.
The truth is cholesterol is just cholesterol. (A fatty, waxy chemical created in the liver used in the construction of cells) In fact new cells cannot be made without it. There is now evidence that Alzheimer's and many other diseases are linked to the popular use of statin drugs over the last 30 years due to lack of cholesrerol.
The only "bad" cholesterol is cholesterol that has become oxidized and the only way to undo this oxidation is by feeding our bodies with anti-oxidant rich foods and herbs. See Video: Exposing the Cholesterol Myth with Dr. Ron Rosedale: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=awA2fsa9...
Now when extra help (Beyond food) is required to balance cholesterol a formula of three Chinese herbs has been shown to take care of the situation masterfully. Two herbs in the formula that help move and thin blood without stopping the clotting factor are Tien Qi and Dan Shen. These two herbs are remarkable for blood behavior and heart balance. These herbs are then combined with another amazing herb called Jiao Gu Lan that will get rid of blood-fat and plaque as well as prevent and stop oxidation of cholesterol. (An article on Jiao Gu Lan at Natural News can be seen here: http://www.naturalnews.com/023077.html )The combination of these three herbs (In equal parts by weight) becomes a formula which is called "Low Chol" and it is truly a remarkable combination.
If you want to bring the "LDL numbers" and "cholesterol numbers" down to satisfy the drug-pushing doctors (A very stupid reason when all you have to do is say, "no") or if you need the numbers down to pass a job physical or something, then there is a built in "safety valve". The fact is this formula will actually bring these numbers down. However it is not the actual cholesterol you are bringing down. (Thank God) but it does get the doctors and insurance companies "off your back" while you are doing a world of good for your blood health.
Cholesterol and LDL that have become rancid, oxidized, or otherwise corrupt causes the particles to become smaller (So they tend to get stuck together and clog things up) This causes inflammation. (which is dangerous as far as heart atacks are concerned) Also when the particles are unhealthy and small this causes a higher number reading in blood tests. When they are healthy and large the numbers will be smaller even if you have lots of cholesterol!
Now if you were actually bringing down cholesterol itself (Like statin drugs do) you would be doing major harm to your cellular reproduction factors. This unfortunately goes on daily and the drug pushing doctors say they have "saved lives" when in fact they have taken thousands of lives.
This form of deception has ruined and shortened the lives of hundreds of thousands of people seeking better health through the medical system. It is one of the saddest things the author thought he would ever see. Then, like a one-two punch came the FDA's announcement that melamine in small amounts was just fine for babies. How low can they go? Does one dare ask where it will end? Well, all one can do in this war that has been raged on our health is take on one thing at a time.
So for those with unhealthy blood cholesterol, the author would strongly recommend the right healthy antioxidant rich foods, (Mike Adams has a tremendous list of these) taking herbal formulas like "Low Chol" and most importantly of all, if you ever see a doctor, please learn to say the words, "No, It is my health not yours".
About the author
Christopher Gussa, Is a TCM practitioner and Certified Master / Clinical Herbalist for 25 years. He is certified in both Western Herbal Therapy and Traditional Chinese Herbal Medicine with over 25 years experience. Chris founded Plant Cures Inc. which handcrafts over 150 Serious Herbal Medicine Products for Specific Disorders all created through clinical application. Their products are for Serious Disease and also Powerful Tonic Health. Please visit Plant Cures at WWW.PLANTCURES.COM or call them at 1-800 979 2027
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Three Chinese Herbs could Put an End to Statin Drugs - Truth About Good and Bad Cholesterol... plzchuckle
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There are several different types of cholesterol. The ones we hear most about are often referred to as the “good” cholesterol and the “bad” cholesterol. The bad cholesterol, otherwise known as LDL cholesterol, gets its notoriety from the fact that it transports cholesterol throughout the body. It therefore, provides the cholesterol that might become trapped in artery walls and form plaque. HDL cholesterol is considered the good guy because it brings cholesterol back to the liver for reprocessing and possible elimination from the body.
Although HDL and LDL cholesterol are commonly referred to as the good and bad cholesterols this really isn’t the case. There are two other forms of cholesterol that actually deserve the labels “good” and “bad.”
All forms of natural cholesterol, the type normally found in the body, are good and necessary. Whether it is transported as LDL or HDL, cholesterol provides the body with building blocks to manufacture hormones, cell membranes, vitamin D, etc. Cholesterol is absolutely vital to good health. It is not an evil villain. It’s illogical to believe that nature would create a substance that is vital for good health but is also toxic.
Something that is good, however, can become bad under certain circumstances. When cholesterol becomes oxidized, its bad side comes out. When researchers analyze arterial plaque what they find is oxidized cholesterol. Oxidized cholesterol is the only form of cholesterol that collects in arterial plaque. Normal, healthy, cholesterol does not build up in artery walls. When fats and oils are oxidized they become rancid and, consequently, toxic. Cholesterol is the same way. Natural cholesterol is harmless, but when it is damaged by oxidation it turns bad.
Years ago researchers discovered that if they put oxidized cholesterol into test diets lab animals developed atherosclerosis in a matter of weeks. If they fed normal cholesterol to animals it was nearly impossible for them to develop atherosclerosis even when they were fed massive amounts of it. Blood cholesterol levels could rise to over 800 mg/dl and still atherosclerosis would not develop unless oxidized cholesterol was used. Today oxidized cholesterol is routinely used in cholesterol research to induce atherosclerosis in test animals.
The vast majority of the cholesterol circulating in our blood is manufactured in the liver. Only a small amount comes from the diet. Cholesterol manufactured by the liver is obviously not rancid and, therefore, not oxidized. The cholesterol in fresh, natural foods, likewise, is not oxidized. But foods that have been overly processed may contain oxidized (i.e., rancid) cholesterol. The foods that are most likely to contain oxidized cholesterol are animal products that have been dehydrated, dried, or powdered.
The foods with the highest oxidized cholesterol content are: dried cheese, powdered whole milk, powdered eggs, powdered butter, hard meats, etc. These types of foods are often used in packaged prepared foods. For instance, a boxed cake mix will list eggs or milk in the ingredients. Obviously for the mix to be dry these ingredients must be dehydrated or powdered. Finished baked goods may not be any safer. Was the cake you bought last week at your local grocery store made with fresh eggs or powdered? It’s possible that the bakery used a mix containing powdered eggs.
How about the packaged spaghetti or macaroni and cheese you made last night? Did it come with a packet of powdered cheese?
Did the last pizza you eat contain pepperoni? Did it have powdered Parmesan cheese?
The “good” cholesterol is the cholesterol that is formed in your body and the cholesterol found in fresh, natural foods. The “bad” cholesterol, the one that causes problems, is oxidized cholesterol that is found in many highly processed foods.
To avoid bad cholesterol you need to look at ingredient labels. Avoid foods with all suspect ingredients. Better yet, avoid all processed, packaged foods and only eat fresh, whole foods. Make your meals from scratch so you know exactly what you are eating. This is what our great grandparents did. In their day heart disease was essentially unheard of. Today with all of the innovations of modern food processing heart disease has become our number one killer.
Instead of worrying about cholesterol levels we should be worried more about the types of foods we eat and the type of cholesterol in those foods. There is no doubt many factors that contribute to heart disease. However, eating better seems to make a big difference and it is something you can start doing right now.
The Truth About Good and Bad Cholesterol
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Copyright © 2007, 2005, Bruce Fife. All rights reserved. - 24-Hour Diet, The plzchuckle
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MoreThis is a reply to # 2,126,877
For Beyond 50's "Natural Healing" talks, watch a video interview with bestselling author Professor Brian Peskin. According to him, everything you've learned about nutrition is all wrong! He busts the most common nutritional myths and corrects them with the latest research findings. He is the world's most trusted authority on health and nutrition. Through his book, "The 24-Hour Diet", you'll learn about the most ideal way to eat well and the Science behind it that's never been revealed before to the general public. Peskin is also the author of "The Hidden Story of Cancer" about oxygen deficiency on a cellular level as the primary cause of cancer. Visit http://www.Beyond50Radio.com
and sign up for our free e-newsletter.
*Interview by Daniel Davis. Video produced and edited by Joy Ramos Davis of Beyond 50 Productions.
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